


Between Two Nothings

by VegabondGloria



Category: Odin Sphere
Genre: F/M, Feels, Post-Canon, Spoilers
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-17
Updated: 2017-01-17
Packaged: 2018-09-18 02:12:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 482
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9361010
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VegabondGloria/pseuds/VegabondGloria
Summary: When you have all the time in the world, it's difficult to understand what it even means to exist anymore.





	

**Author's Note:**

> Not actually sure if I'll continue this. The first chapter was written on a whim OTL
> 
> Edit 1/24/2017: Made edits to the tags and description since I don't see myself continuing this anytime soon.

Eternity is difficult to describe. The synonyms are easy to come up with; endless, ongoing, forever, infinity. But actually describing the feelings of being in that timeless void--scent, touch, sight, emotion--everything comes up blank because, at least for him, eternity is both everything and nothing. There’s never a beginning and never an end. He still can’t decide if that’s a blessing in itself or the greatest torture for a mortal. Maybe it’s better that he doesn’t.

Time continues to both tick on and stop. Ingway doesn’t know how long it’s been and how much longer it will be. The same expectation keeps coming into his head; that this eternity he is experiencing is just a small glimmer of hope that’s going to be blotted out any second by the Halja. They will come, snuff the light in the darkness, and begin the punishment that has been destined for him since the moment of his death.

He’s in Hel. Or, rather, he’s _ supposed _ to be. The Netherworld is the land where the departed souls of humans and other “earthen” beings go and he knows he’s there, but he never feels like he is. He can’t even hear the souls of the other damned, but the cold stones beneath him that chill him to his core tell him all he needs to know.

But he is always warm. He can smell the spring breeze through the stench of rotting flesh and basks in sunlight while still being cloaked in the blackest night. He sleeps and wakes, sleeps and wakes, always between one and the other. He has one thing to thank for that.

The little white flower always dances in his vision, flickering and blurring but never fading. Little golden motes float from its stem and petals--they vanish into the misty darkness, but they always come back, glimmering softly and sometimes traveling over his fingers when he rarely outstretches them. The stem is fragile; he wishes time and time again that he could caress the circle of snow the petals make, but he fears breaking it and ending this peace.

He sometimes thinks he hears a voice murmur, quiet and sad. Something touches his cheek and he remembers the tenderness of that girl’s hand, the way it almost tried to tighten on his calluses as he pulled away, but he was too quick for her. The flower is a reminder of her face and he desperately wants to see it again. That’s the only aching he knows--to see those wide cherry red eyes and brush his fingers against golden braids the color of an endless wheat field. He doesn’t want to just remember it. Not anymore.

If this eternity is a punishment in knowing unending longing, then he’s fine with it. At least there’s a beautiful sense of being there with  _ something _ as he drifts into yet another lucid dream.


End file.
